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Ngunjiri Wambugu

On August 30, 2017 President Kenyatta held his first Parliamentary Group meeting for all elected MPs/Senators at State House.

We had not even been sworn it and this was to happen the next day – 31st August).

This was the same PG where Aden Duale and Kipchumba Murkomen were made Majority Leaders and from where many of Ruto’s allies were later made powerful Parliamentary committee chairs]. 

In this PG the President thanked us for campaigning for a Jubilee win, and then specifically asked for the help and support of all of us elected leaders – including the DP who was seated next to him – to enable him consolidate his legacy as he was on his second and final term in office. 

He particularly asked us to focus on delivering what we had promised Kenyans during the just ended and very divisive campaigns, and to do whatever we needed to do, to unite all Kenyans, now that the elections were over.

One thing the President made very clear. If he were to achieve and cement his legacy by 2022 we had to #AvoidPrematureCampaigns. He was very specific. Campaigns by their very nature are socially divisive. 

This means that if we start premature campaigns for 2022 – which was 5 years away – before we had achieved what we needed to achieve, we would divide Kenyans – and he needed a united country to deliver his agenda and legacy. 

He specifically asked us to reach out and bring those who had not voted with us on board so that all Kenyans would work together beyond their 2017 political affiliations to build one nation moving forward. 

He then very specifically promised that  if we agreed to what he was asking of us and committed ourselves to working with him for the next 4 years without divisive politics he would personally lead the campaign for the election of DP William Ruto as the 5th President of Kenya from 2021.

He made this assurance directly to the DP, who was seated next to him.

Unfortunately, as soon as Kenya settled down after the again very vicious and divisive repeat election process, Ruto immediately started organising and positioning himself as the next President after Uhuru.

And he did this with absolute contempt and without any fear of what Uhuru would have thought about it.

When the President reached out to his 2017 rival Raila Odinga in the famous handshake so as to bring down political temperatures and unite all Kenyans around him, Ruto was the first person to fight this handshake. Again he did this deliberately.

When the President initiated the BBI process that he hopes will be the opportunity for Kenyans to speak to each other about what makes politics so divisive, Ruto was the first person to reject it. 

Ruto has thus become the source of the political divisions Uhuru asked us to try to reduce in 2017. 

Finally Ruto has also personally introduced and is strongly pushing the ‘Dynasties Vs Hustlers’ political narrative – a very dangerous rich vs poor political ideology that would cause chaos that make 2007 PEV look like child’s play. 

This narrative is also a direct attack on President Uhuru Kenyatta due to his personal family background.

Ruto also does not shy away and publicly and privately speaks very contemptuously.